Yet another very early morning. I was outside shortly after 6:00 AM and the ship was in a complete white out. I couldn’t see anything. I was pretty disappointed. I sat outside at the Great Outdoors for a couple of minutes and then realized the skies opened up and I could see.
The itinerary said we were supposed to go down Endicott Arm to Dawes Glacier. Been there, done that, wasn’t all that thrilling. Captain must have made the decision to go down Tracy Arm instead. I haven’t been down Tracy Arm, so I was happy.
There were large chunks of ice the captain had to sail around.
The visibility got better and the water was a special turquoise from the glacial ice. ANd of course there were plenty of waterfalls.
I loved the contrast between the water, rocks and trees.
The light wispy clouds added another dimension to the beauty.
A couple blocks of ice got stranded on land during low tide.
This place is so spectacular you could drop your camera and still take amazing photos.
An even larger chunk of ice. The little brown things are rocks, not critters.
More photos on the way to try and get to Sawyer Glacier.
There was a very big chunk of ice at a bend in the fjord. I thought for sure the Captain would stop here, but he passed it without a problem.
And the views further down the fjord are still just amazing. I’m very happy for the itinerary change.
We were nearly as far as we could go in the large ship.
And at about 8:20 AM the Captain announced we were as far as we could possibly go, and in the distance you could see Sawyer Glacier.
The much smaller American Queen cruise ship continued closer. I don’t know how close they got, but their ship looks like the ones I see in Norway…
There was another little boat like I took a few years ago.
The ship turned around and I got more pictures as we returned back through Tracy Arm.
More amazing scenery
And then just by chance a magical rainbow appeared! I took a bunch of photos. Hard to pick the best one.
It was now almost 10 AM and almost back out of the fjord. A few last photos.
We started up the channel to Juneau around 12:30 PM and I got a few photos of the waterfalls and a sea plane.
And then we were docking in Juneau yet again.
Any guess to what I am doing today? Yes, I am going up in the Goldbelt Tram again.
This time I decided the 15 minute walk wouldn’t kill me (and I could actually see the mountain), so I walked into town. It didn’t actually seem that far.
When I went into the tram station I knew to skip the queue and exchanged my ticket for the tram ticket without waiting in line. It didn’t take long to get on the tram headed up.
I made sure to spend extra time on the platform at the top after getting off to enjoy the view. It really is the best place to see the city.
I zoomed in and got a photo of the whale statue. It even looks like the fountain was running.
A few more photos before going on a hike.
I hiked in the same direction as last week, clockwise and took pictures of the waterfall from across the valley.
And after a short hike I was back around to the observation points towards the city and cruise ships.
I watched the presentation about the local Native Americans. This time it was an elder and he was much better at providing information about his heritage than the young woman last week. He explained many things about his culture, how the two different clans must marry each other, funeral ceremonies, the regalia, and he even performed a song. It was worth spending time time to watch him. I wish I recorded a video of him talking.
I briefly visited a couple of souvenir shops, but resisted the urge to buy any Chinese “3 generation shirts”.
Back on the ship I had dinner at Moderno again. My “salad” consisted of sushi, Prosciutto and bacon.
I made a point not to fill up on the normal meats, I made sure to get my favorite – Picanha. I did save some room for dessert. Tonight I decided to try the banana caramel meringue tartlet.
Later I made the mistake of going to the late night comedy show. It was not funny at all. I hope they don’t invite him back on, last week’s comedienne was actually funny.
Today’s timeline:
